


The Two-Legged Freak

by jazzfic



Category: Big Bang Theory
Genre: F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-04-22
Updated: 2011-04-22
Packaged: 2017-10-18 12:19:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,124
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/188828
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jazzfic/pseuds/jazzfic
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There's silly, irrational fear and then there's silly, irrational fear let loose in the mind of a genius. As usual, it's left to Penny to put things right.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Two-Legged Freak

_spiders don't swim, but they sure as hell leap_

 

It always happens this way. Because life's just one big party where you walk through blindfolded, bumping into things that make a mess of fate and everything your so-called psychic failed to predict. Upset a bowl of punch—there go your childhood dreams. Knock into the card table—that's every jerk you ever dated, beer breath and a sticky hand on your thigh. Impale yourself on the pinata—that's your car broken down again, your sorry excuse for a job, gas bills, your unpaid, unfulfilled life.

Until it's all turned the wrong way down and the right way forward. And all because of eight little legs.

 

 

She's torso deep in the unfolded mess of her wardrobe, looking for a pair of running pants that couldn't have possibly migrated to the land of lost clothes since last fall, when Penny hears the yell from 4A. Her reaction is so knee jerk that she's up and halfway across the hall before she realises that it's Sheldon's voice. She slows because Sheldon yelling for dear life can mean almost anything, and bitter experience has taught her that once you get sucked into that vortex you're stuck...there...like...glue.

"Penny!"

Aw, hell.

 _"Penny!"_

How did he know she was even home? He probably planted a mindmeld on her (or whatever that knee-bendy thing Spock does is called, except Penny kind of thinks Kirk just needed to stretch, because sleeping with a thousand alien girls has gotta pull some muscles; but you know, if Spock's on hand to work his magic, then yeah, awesome) during one of his bi-weekly acts of creeping up behind her at the mail boxes, just to ensure he has car trips for the next eighty-five years. She wouldn't put it beyond him.

"Sheldon?"

"Penny!" Then within a syllable almost, the tone of his voice changes. "Penny, don't...don't come in here!"

She stomps towards the sound, to the boys' bathroom, all sorts of irritated now. "For god's sake, Sheldon, if you don't want me to come then don't yell—"

And that's when the bathroom door opens.

And Sheldon's standing before her...

...and

he's

wet

...and

he's

wearing—

"Pennythere'sagiant _thing_ intherewehaveto—"

Sheldon's body and Sheldon's voice are currently occupying the same space just outside the bathroom, not four inches from Penny, and his words are tumbling out like bullets in a Halo battle, or those sparkles that zoom after Sonic the Hedgehog. But Penny doesn't hear any of it, because he's got nothing on but a Spiderman towel, and he's dripping all over and...it's _Sheldon_.

"Um. Okay. What giant thing?" she asks, because maybe she did hear something, and maybe it's important, so.

Okay.

Spiderman's curled in one of his rooftop swings, body bent at a crazy angle. There's a red leg that disappears around Sheldon's waist, and together they realise that Penny's eyes are both wondering and wandering and whatever this crisis is he's not doing a very good job giving her the best of pep-talk summaries.

Sheldon stills. He takes in a breath and says, in small, staccato bursts, "There's a giant arachnid. In the shower. Near krypton. The noble gases. The _periodic table_ , Penny."

The words slow to a trickle as he nears the end of the sentence. Which is good. Because now Penny's back in the present.

"A spider," she says, slowly. "You screamed out my name...because of a spider?"

Well, back enough to recognise irony when it's made of plush cotton and is sitting flush beneath a sprinkling of freckles, a hard, flat stomach, and higher up, still wet cheeks that are blushing for the first time in perhaps, oh ever.

 

 

And, no. The fact does not escape her, just how frighteningly similar this is to another day, another apartment, another time when fate just happened to shove Penny from 4B and Sheldon from 4A into the same wonderful adventure. Awkward encounter in a place designed for ablutions and soap and general all-round nakedness? Check. A conversation that involves two individuals speaking English but one making sense only to himself and possibly robots from a distant galaxy? Check. Penny wanting to blink or click her heels and leave the Land of Oz because, oh god, it's Sheldon? Check. Why, _why_ is it that whenever these things happen, there he is, either the cause, or the explanation, or the goddamn start-up creator of Let's Make Penny's Day a World of Fun.

If she knew, she'd do her own name proud and make a pretty dollar. And then watch, like a spectator in the bleachers, as if her life were a ball game but without the fun of making out after in the dugout, as he takes credit for the whole thing.

 

 

Penny sighs.

She opens the door. "Why don't you just show me—"

There's a squeak behind her, a vaguely squelching noise, and she turns to see Sheldon disappearing. There's a click as his bedroom door shuts. His voice carries through the wood, a little shrilly. "I've given you precise enough locator instructions, Penny. There should be no need for my assistance in this mission. Although it occurs to me that while I mentioned krypton initially, there is a likelihood that it may have...moved on."

"Oh. You mean to bigger and better things?" asks Penny gamely.

"Don't be ridiculous. There's hardly a career path for stray arachnids. Unless it happens to fall upon the _transition_ elements, and make a nonsensical but still amusing pun."

"Yeah," she mutters to herself. "So not what I was going to say..."

 

 

Okay, so it does turn out to be kind of big. And Penny figures if she gives the world a moment of peace by preventing another Sheldon freak-out, then good: she's Queen Penelope, here to serve.

Unsurprisingly, Sheldon declines to see the monster caught (politely at first, then so adamant that his voice breaks two registers), but she can't resist waving the glass and lid before his face, figuring he has to at least have a proper opportunity to say goodbye. But his eyes widen, and his face twitches, and he looks about ready to bolt again for his bedroom, so she smiles grandly and takes pity.

Give him two minutes, and he'll move on to more interesting, Sheldon-type activities. Like spend the afternoon sieving the dry herbs so the flakes are uniformly shaped. Or go crazy and make hot chocolate with that extra, illicit spoonful.

It's only silly, irrational fear.

 

 

(Besides. She's got something to sleep on, too, has Penny. Something pretty illicit in its own small way.

The point where Spidey's red spider legs reached. And those drops on the floor, slipped over pale ankles, to his naked feet.)


End file.
